On the 9th day of Christmas...

...my true love gave to me, a rest and a chance to pick my favorite so far.

On the 8th day of Christmas...

...my true love gave to me, a brand new pair of pink ice skates

On the 7th day of Christmas...

...my true love gave to me, A PUPPY!

On the 6th day of Christmas

...my true love gave to me, a new iPhone 6.

I inked the iphone messages after I took the picture and I forgot to take another pic.

Here's the conversations:

Gray message: whatcha doin?
Green message:  nothing, just chillin.  Get it...just chilling.
Gray message: LOL
Green message: n u?
Gray message: gettin ready to melt u later.
Green message: Whaaaa?!?!?!
Gray message: stupid autocorrect...MEET you later.
Green message: No worries, happens to the best of us.

On the 5th day of Christmas...

...my true love gave to me, winter berries to put under the tree.

On the 4th day of Christmas...

... my true love gave to me, a candy cane filled with love.

On the 3rd day of Christmas...

my true love gave to me...the Christmas shopping list for all our family and friends.

On the 2nd day of Christmas...

My true love gave to me, a marathon of my favorite Christmas movie.

On the 1st day of Christmas...

My true love gave to me a walk in a winter wonderland!

Christmas postCards (wait, what?)

For the first time in my life I made my very own Christmas cards!  Well, to be exact, Christmas postcards.  I know postcards, what an unusual way to send a holiday greeting.  I'm a real pioneer woman, a trailblazer....a maverick (thanks Palin & McCain for making that word 10x more awesome).  Not really, I'm just a woman who should always wear her glasses.

But, this was a lot of fun and here are the materials I used to create my cards.

 Picture 1 from left to right: Porcelain palette (for mixing ink), small & large white eraser, Strathmore Watercolor Postcards, Dr. Watson India Ink , 2H pencil & cheap acrylic 00 brush (for inking).

Picture 2: empty margarine tub (ink contaminates water pretty easily, so when I have a lot of inking to do, I like to have a large tub of water)

Not pictured: Watercolor paints!

Drawing with my nephew Tyler

It was so much fun!  I went home to help my family and I got to spend some time drawing with my nephew Ty (age 8).  Here's the picture he gave me.  I love the trees!
 

 I

I have an announcement!

If you're not able to view the video, here is the Youtube Link (it's an unlisted video, so you can only access it from my blog).

And, if the hyperlink doesn't work, here's the web address:    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Oq9qvmd3IMQ&list=UU7m0S30uwXIdnB0GoCPNFzQ

Mr. Bojangles

After all of my redrawing and practice with 30-90 second gesture drawings, I thought it was time to make an original character design that played with everything I've been studying.  It was so much fun!

Re-draw Thursday #4

I found some random images during a Google search and I thought it was the perfect opportunity to play with Prismacolor markers.

 

Re-draw Thursday #3

So, this re-draw Thursday is from Fancy Nancy and Toon Box Studios.  I must say that I'm enjoying re-draw Thursdays and I'm learning a lot.  My line art and ability to see form are improving.

Redraw Thursday # 2

So, for this Redraw Thursday I decided to play with Prismacolor markers and who better to redraw than....Will Terrell.  Six hundred years ago, I bought 25 Prismacolor markers with a Groupon from Jerry's Artarama, but I never used them.  Up until now, the only markers I've ever used had Crayola written on the side and were NEVER used for coloring (as a kidI strongly believed that pretty, pretty princesses could only be colored with crayon).   So, thank you Will Terrell for making markers look easy!

As for the woman with the cell phone, I'll probably practice line art and ink her later.

 

Daily Doodle

For today's daily doodle I thought I'd try some different face shapes.  On a side note, everyone in the coffee shop tonight had on glasses.  

Sketchbook

What's on my desk: finishing and cleaning up a sketch

This was supposed to be my Illustration Friday: Natural submission, but with the end of school looming on the horizon there aren't nearly enough hours in the day.  I hope to have it finished by this Friday, along with my Vanity submission.

What's in my sketchbook today...

Can you guess which sketch I like the most, and which one is my alter ego?

Fearfully and Wonderfully made

I went for coffee with a friend and as usual she says the most wonderful things, so wonderful it made me do a quick sketch.

Re-Draw Rhursday

Sometimes churning out 12 sketches a week can be a little daunting, so I've decided to dedicate Thursday to re-creating sketches from my favorite artist.  This Thursday it's Mo and Tiffany.

Writer's Workshop with Karen Hulene Bartell

My local library hosted what I thought was supposed to be a writer's workshop on self publishing, but was actually just a writer's workshop.  It was fun and a lot of the information could easily be applied to art--as long as you scratch out the word "writing" and insert "painting" or "drawing" in its place.  I don't want to infringe on Karen's intellectual property by posting her entire workshop, so instead I'll share 5 things that I learned...

"There's no such thing as an aspiring writer artist.  You are a writer an artist. Period."--revised quote from Mathew Reilly

#1 Have strong entries and endings--you want to grab your readers by the noses on the way in and kick their asses on the way out! (wasn't phrased exactly like that, but you get the gist)

#2 Show, don't tell.

#3 Be aware of all the conventions of writing (ie: punctuation)  art (ie: perspective, proportions, color theory, design principles/elements)  You want people to be pulled in by your content and not driven away by your errors.  So, keep editing, put it away and then edit again.

#4 Always carry a small notebook sketchbook  with you and write draw/paint at least 2 entries a day, 12 a week.  Write about Draw everything you see and try to write  draw complete scenes as opposed to small one line entries.

#5 If you're stuck, select a noun (a person, place or thing), and write everything you can remember about that noun. List all the facts, then zero in on one fact and turn that into a short story.  The act of writing can help you find inspiration and get unstuck.  I think the art equivalent would be to pick a noun or an adjective and create as many thumbnails of it as you can...remember the creepy boyfriend from Ugly Betty who filled an entire art gallery with paintings of her.  Change mediums, artistic styles, view points, how you incorporate the subject matter; when you're done, pick a thumbnail and turn it into a fully colored drawing.

Last thought...

"If a story is in you, it has to come out"--William Faulkner